


How to Mend a Broken Heart

by kageillusionz



Category: X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-29
Updated: 2014-11-29
Packaged: 2018-02-27 11:06:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2690561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kageillusionz/pseuds/kageillusionz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Logan convinces Charles to keep going, to restart the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	How to Mend a Broken Heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [frissoningg](https://archiveofourown.org/users/frissoningg/gifts).



> **Prompt:** A combination of:  
>  Something romantic based off the scene where Logan convinces Charles to use his powers again. Charles powers work best when his hearts not broken? Logan helps with that?  
> Logan being in love with future Charles and being even more in love with 70s Charles. Preferably requited.
> 
> Please enjoy!

Logan watched the back of Charles’ wheelchair spin and head towards the exit of Cerebro. He could feel the frustration emanated off Charles in waves and quietly approached Charles lest he lashed out like a wounded animal.

“I… I feel like one of my students,” Charles said bitterly, scrubbing at his face with the heel of one hand. His hands were shaking. It must have felt overwhelming using his powers again after so long. Logan had never seen Charles like that. “Helpless. It was a mistake coming down here. It was a mistake freeing Erik. This whole thing has been one bloody mistake.”

He couldn’t agree more. Logan had been sceptical when Erik — the old Erik with whom Logan had reached an accord, unlike that jumpstart little shit Magneto from the 70s — had requested to be found. They had done well enough to even pull off that prison break. And for what? To have that stubborn asshat fuck off into the great blue yonder, without so much as a by your leave. Rude as fuck if you asked Logan.

What could have been a wonderful plan that involved Magneto reforging his lost connection after being imprisoned for so many years, had now turned into a plan that also included contingencies when facing a megalomaniac with a tendency to react first, ask later. Logan wondered for a brief tantalizing moment what life would be like without men like Magneto.

Charles continued, “They sent back the wrong man.” Those words echoed around Cerebro, bouncing off the metallic walls and cutting deep inside Logan’s chest. These past few nights, in hotel rooms all over the world, Logan had been wondering what could have happened if Kitty had sent back the older, wiser Charles or even Erik. He had spent too much time wondering if the clusterfuck in Paris could have been avoided of Magneto weren’t such an asshole. Logan’s almost convinced that Erik would have done a much better job of breaking himself out and not fucking up.

“I am,” Logan admitted wearily, plucking the hand gently off Charles’ face and brushing a stray strand of hair away. Charles didn’t pull away as if burned that Logan took as a good sign, though his eyes were screwed shut.

Logan knew lacked the charisma that most leaders possessed. He was brusque and graduated with top marks from the School of Negotiations and Problem Solving via Necessary Force, and he was damned good at it. But despite all of Logan’s… limitations, there was one thing that set Logan apart.

And that was the love he harboured for Charles Xavier, that had once started as a small kernel within himself that had blossomed underneath Charles’ guidance and endless patience.

“It was supposed to be you, you know, but you got me instead. And to tell you the truth, I don’t know how long I have left here.” Kitty’s powers was a variable that was untested against sending back someone several months. There was no telling how long she could hold on or even how long the last of the X-Men could keep the Sentinels out to buy them enough time. The sooner he finished this and saved the future from certain destruction, the better.

Charles shot him a look, his eyebrows knitted together. He was uncharacteristically hesitant and timid. And Logan could see that deep inside, past the leather jacket and the scraggly hair, was that Charles Xavier was afraid of his own powers.

“Actually, a long time from now, I was your most helpless student. And _you_  unlocked my mind. You showed me what I could be.” He couldn’t remember a time before he had met and befriended Charles Xavier, aside from drinking himself into a stupor and picking up questionable side jobs to make a quick buck.

“But I don’t know how to do that for you… but I know someone that can.” Telepathy. Logan wasn’t afraid of what this Charles could see in there, but what could he personally do to help a psionic?

The helplessness fell away into shock. “You want me inside your head? You saw what I did to Cerebro.” Charles, sweet beautiful Charles, who wore his heart and bled on his sleeve, was hard to surprise being a telepath and that made Logan grin.

Logan leant down to better look into Charles’ blue eyes. “There’s no damage in there that hasn’t already been done.” Logan smirks reassuringly, reaching out to squeeze at Charles’ shoulder. “Trust me.”

Charles reached up, touching fingers to Logan’s temples. His telepathy unfurled like a cat, its fur standing on end and unfamiliar from lack of use. It pawed through Logan’s thoughts and memories, pausing once it brushes up against Logan’s affection. “You—! You’re—in love with me? Were in love…?”

“Yes,” Logan agreed, reaching forward to cup Charles’ face with a callused hand. It was impossible to hide anything. “Who wouldn’t? You wouldn’t know it since this place is now closed, but you helped a lot of us when we had nowhere else to go or anyone to believe in us. I… I wouldn’t be here now if it weren’t for you, and I owe you.”

Charles’ Adams apple bobs, fingers gently stroking down Logan’s cheeks. “How can anyone like me? How could–”

“How could they not?” Logan replied gruffly, wanting nothing more than to shake some sense into this younger, bitter version of the man he had come to trust implicitly.

Charles lets out a bitter laugh, pulling his hands away and leaning back into the wheelchair. “I’m not the man that you love or know, Logan. I’m not a… a teacher or a leader. Just look at Raven and Erik. How can I be trusted to teach when I have failed two of the closest people I know? That’s what I am. A failure. This. Cerebro, trying all again. Was a bloody mistake.” The motor inside the wheelchair whirred to life as it moved towards the lift.

How Charles managed to get himself out of this funk the first time around was a mystery. Logan was fast running out of encouraging things to say, never been a man of many words in the first place. He jogged to catch up to Charles, squeezing in beside him before the elevator doors closed.

“I don’t know how you managed to convince yourself out of this the first time around, but you are not responsible for either Mystique’s or Magneto’s actions. So whatever you’re feeling needs to fucking stop. It’s not good to blame yourself for shit that they know the consequences of,” Logan itched for a cigar.

Charles remained quiet when the elevator stopped on the ground floor. The wheelchair veered off down the hallway, towards the section that had been the staff quarters. “Then what of my students? My first class? Sean. Alex. Darwin. Angel. They’re all dead because of me.”

“You still have Hank,” Logan pointed out, holding the door open for Charles to wheel himself in. “He cares about you and needs you still. And not just him. There are thousands of mutants out there that need the protection that you will one day offer. I don’t know what happens once my time here is up, but I’m not going to remember much about history and will needthe help of the greatest telepath to help me regain my memories.”

“I’m hardly…” Charles blubbered, feeling a little flustered by Logan’s compliments, and slowly transferred himself into bed.

Logan does his best not to hover, fists uncurling when Charles was safely underneath within his blankets. “You are. It’s probably best that you get some rest. We will need you at your full strength.”

“Will you stay with me?" Charles asked, pinning Logan with bright blue eyes. "Only until I fall asleep?”

"If that is what you want, Charles."

"Yes."

* * *

A few months later after the debacle of Washington and bloody Erik’s escape, Charles donned Cerebro once more. Logan was gone for now, choosing to return to Canada for the time being after making sure Hank and Charles would be able to fend for themselves — despite Hank’s insistence that they were perfectly capable of looking after themselves.

He lost himself in the web of bright minds that he was able to touch and register. Charles sighed quietly, eyes flickering from underneath closed eyelids to try and keep up with how many minds were pressing against his telepathy.

When Charles was in Cerebro, he lost all sense of time floating, through the psionic plane. It wasn’t until Hank interrupted by shutting off the power to Cerebro that he realised he had spent several hours hooked up. There was no sign of Raven or Erik.

“There’s someone at the door,” Hank said. Charles’ telepathy was buzzing from the previous exertions, the beginnings of a migraine brewing behind his left eye.

“Can it wait? My head’s killing me.” Charles dug the heel of his palm against his eyelid, craving something strong to go with the drink he was going to pour as soon as Hank left him to his own devices.

“I don’t think so. It’s something you’d want to see.” Hank sounded adamant. Charles scowled and muttered something unsavoury underneath his breath, resigned to wheel himself into the foyer with a pained grimace.

There were two men standing there, one carrying a military issued bag, and the other a leather suitcase. It took Charles an embarrassingly long time to recognize Alex waiting. Alex he could recognize, but Darwin’s face took him longer to parse together. But damn, it was good to see their faces again, to see hime alive and whole. Tension that Charles carried within him eased away to be replaced by relief, happiness and hope.

Hank smirked like the cat that got the canary.

“Professor!”

“Is it really you, Darwin?”

“Yes.” Darwin’s smile was luminous. ”It’s good to see you again, Professor. Alex was looking for me and here we are.”

“Here you are,” Charles repeated, still couldn’t quite believe that Darwin was standing in front of him. “I thought…”

“Restoration took me a bit longer and by that time, Langley was undergoing restoration, and I hadn’t any idea where you were. None of the CIA would tell me anything.” Darwin scowled at the mention of the government agency. “And then Alex found me. We came as soon as we could.”

“Some guy named Logan told us he was a friend of yours,” Alex said with a nonchalant shrug. “Gave us his car to get here. Said he’d be back to visit when he tore away on a stolen bike or something.”

“Alex can’t drive,” Darwin said with a wry laugh.

“You try learning how to drive in solitary,” Alex scowled in return.

It was good, no more than that, overwhelming but in a good way to have them back. All of a sudden, faced by their collective smiles and banter, Charles realised he was could rise to the occasion -he had to for these boys who came back to him- and be the leader that Logan believed and knew he would become. With Alex and Darwin back, he wouldn’t have to start the school alone with Hank. He could do this again, especially when there were so many things to look forward to. The future, of the school, of everything, wasn’t looking so bad.

And perhaps he would see Logan again soon.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks a bunch to **a** for her endless cheerleading and betaing skills. Any lingering mistakes are my own.


End file.
